HAMBURG, Germany and OXFORD, England, March 10 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Evotec AG (Frankfurt Stock Exchange: EVT, TecDAX 30) today announced that the second milestone in its research collaboration with Boehringer Ingelheim has been successfully achieved. Under the terms of the drug discovery contract, Evotec will receive a milestone payment from Boehringer Ingelheim which was granted for the identification of a number of lead series for a priority receptor target. This is the second time within eighteen months that a target moves into lead optimisation and this also follows the expansion of the collaboration announced in January.

Further projects within the multi-target collaboration are progressing on schedule and are on track to achieve additional project milestones for which Evotec is entitled to additional payments from Boehringer Ingelheim. In addition, the contract provides substantial long-term upside through potential payments for successful milestone achievements during clinical development and royalties when new drugs reach the market. Further financial details of the payment were not disclosed.

Dr Mark Ashton, Executive Vice President, Business Development, Services at Evotec, commented: "Cooperating with prestigious pharmaceutical companies such as Boehringer Ingelheim is central to Evotec's success. We are extremely proud that we have achieved our second milestone with Boehringer and that we have been able to rapidly advance hit compounds, discovered from screening this target at Evotec, to qualified lead series. This is an excellent validation of our research contribution and is even more pleasing as it comes right at the time that we have significantly extended and expanded our partnership. Our relationship with Boehringer is extremely important to us and we are committed to supporting them in advancing multiple biological targets through to clinical development."

Professor Mikael Dolsten, Head of Corporate Division Pharma Research/Discovery, Boehringer Ingelheim GmbH, said: "We are very pleased with the rapid progress achieved in the collaboration. The basis for this second milestone achievement was both the strong interdisciplinary project work as well as the good team spirit between the Boehringer Ingelheim and Evotec scientists. We are looking forward to further progress with the two advanced projects and to further exciting research activities."